1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a multi-purpose container in which various cargoes are loaded, being bulked small when no cargo is housed.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, various containers corresponding to a variety of cargo are supplied, thereby to reliably protect cargoes during transportation on land or sea.
Containers in which a limited sort of cargoes are housed, for example a refrigerating container, a tank container, a container only for animals etc., are constructed most suitably to the housing cargoes. So remarkable difficulty during loading operation does not recognized.
A popular dry-container houses general merchandises mainly, but the sort of the housing cargoes is not limited.
Loading of the cargoes is achieved by using fork-lift car etc. through an opened door of the container. So the loading operation is not suitable for a long sized cargo, a bulk cargo for its weight (especially a bulk cargo in a length direction of the container) etc.
Accordingly, open-top containers provide a detachable top member, the top surface of which is covered by a canvas cover to protect it from intruding water, or flat-rack containers provided with four pillars standing at four corners, because the cargoes for example glass plates, plant products, bulk bulldozers, iron materials, may be housed in the container by using a crane.
At the arrival place, an unloading operation using cranes similarly to the departure place is carried out, thereby to load or unload cargoes to or from the container is troublesome occasionally.
In the case that cargoes are hot coils, a plurality of hot coils should be loaded in good order by fixing them in turns carried into the container through the door of the main frame member at the predetermined position using wedges and applying lashing. Then the efficiency of loading operation goes down and the accuracy of fixed position of the hot coils goes down. As a result, deformation and/or damage of hot coils will happen because of various forces acting on the hot coils during transportation, in spite of loading hot coils in the container with spending a great deal of labor and time. Accordingly, this loading system of hot coils is not put to practical use.
In the transportation using the container, the frequency of transporting empty containers is nearly the same as the frequency of transporting filled containers, so the space occupied by the empty container is the same as the space occupied by the filled container, thereby to decrease the utilizing efficiency of ships, trucks, freight trains and accumulating place for empty containers.
More specifically, the containers are mainly 20 feet in length and 40 feet in length, each size fall under the ISO standard.
Each total weight is arranged 20 tons and 30 tons respectively, and the maximum height is arranged 8 feet 6 inches to conform to the Road Traffic Control Law and Aft traffic control for example the height of tunnels. The standard container is examining to change the total weight and the maximum height of the 20 feet sized container to 24 tons and 9 feet 6 inches respectively.
These containers are constructed in not permitting disassemblance because enough strength and protection from water are needed considering transportation on sea in the piled condition, thereby to occupy the same space regardless of whether empty or full. Accordingly, the same space as the space of the ships, trucks, freight trains when transporting the cargoes, is needed when transporting the empty containers, thereby to increase the energy waste rate per the volume of transporting cargoes.
This disadvantage will be remarkable when the standard of container is improved as aforementioned.